Chapter 4: Emerging stories from the field
3.9 Ethical considerations
It is normal practice in research to observe ethical issues such as voluntary participation in the study, to acknowledge, respect and guarantee participants’ confidentiality and anonymity (Terre Blanche & Durrheim, 1999). Terre Blanche and Durrheim, (1999) also state that by obtaining consent from the participants is not merely the signing of a consent form but that the consent should be voluntary and informed. This suggests that the participants must be well informed about the purpose of research, implications of their participation. Participants received clear explanation of the tasks expected of them so that they could make an informed choice to participate voluntarily on the research project.
With regards to the selection of educators to participate in this study, I did not play any
significant role. The principal in each school chose educators and explained the purpose of the study. Having said that, I also ensured that I personally negotiated with them and explained the purpose of the study and I actually sought their permission to voluntarily participate in the study. I also explained to them that they had the right to withdraw the certain questions if they were not comfortable in answering them. I also informed them that they had the right to withdraw from the study altogether at any stage of the research process. They seemed to be excited about participating in it. Questions of confidentiality and anonymity were explained as well. I made a promise that I would not disclose their names at any stage during the research process. One of the ways to hide the participants’
identities was the use of codes. Coding was used to ensure anonymity of the twelve participants. While anonymity can be assured, I was aware that sometimes it is very difficult to completely hide the identities of institutions and geographical locations, especially to someone who is familiar with the place. This dynamic is captured by Bhengu (2005) who concurs with Trochim (2002) by saying that sometimes the anonymity codes can be ready be broken. A person who knows the area of research can be decoded and that can put the anonymity ethical issue in disrepute. This is an identification that while researchers can claim that anonymity needs to be assured and guaranteed; sometimes it is difficult to guarantee it (Trochim, 2002; Bhengu, 2005). In a way it is important that researchers try their best to hide the identities of participants but sometimes they may not be successful.
3.10 Reflections on challenges faced the field
In this section I am presenting my personal account of how I experienced conducting fieldwork in the three schools that participated in the study. As part of this account I also share some frustrations that I experienced during the research process. Some of these frustrations include technical glitches some of which are clearly related to my lack of experience in doing research and some of them may be, on hind sight regarded as naïve and foolish. Principals as gatekeepers welcomed me and an introduction was done especially with the participants. The interviews went ahead in a relaxed atmosphere. The only problem that I encountered with participants from school-A was that the learners
were too noisy and as a result it was hard to listen particularly to the deputy-principal and the educator but I managed.
The principal of School-B apologised that I would not be able to interview her deputy- principal, as she would be absent on that particular day. We made an appointment for another day and time to interview the deputy- principal of School-B. When we were about to start our conversation the principal of School-B indicated that she was unhappy to be recorded. I explained the purpose and the significance of tape recording our conversation and I also reminded her of confidentiality and anonymity promises I had made. At no stage did I put pressure on her to agree to be tape recorded against her will and she co-operated after my explanation. I experienced the same problem of noise from the learners and low voice on her part which made the transcription to be slow because of her soft voice. The other form of distraction was caused by the constant desire by the principal to address the problem of noisy learners in their classrooms and thus shifting her attention to the learners but she apologised about that. At if that constant interruption was not enough the HOD of the same school, School-B occasionally interrupted the flow of the interview by asking me to allow her to check her learners since it was a Grade twelve class. Such a situation happened even though we had agreed that our discussion would take place at the time suitable to her. The same thing occurred when we held our discussions with the educator from School-B; interruptions took place in the same way as it had happened with the HOD of the same school. All my participants in this particular school happened to be females, which suggest that only female voices were heard in this school. I honestly do not believe that gender may have anything to do with constant interruptions during the interview process, but it did happen in this school and all my participants were females.
In School-C, I was welcomed by the deputy-principal since the principal was off-sick on that day, but he had left an apology message. He had asked me to arrange for another day that was going to be fine with him. The deputy-principal of this school, as well as the HOD and the educator, requested to be interviewed at the same time, but I explained that such an option would compromise confidentiality and anonymity, and also that each one of them had questions that were peculiar to his or her position in the school. After they
had accepted my explanation, then I had technical problems with my tape recorder. We had to arrange to hold our interview on the same day I would interview the principal On the day set for interviews, I ended up interviewing the principal and an educator. The deputy-principal and an HOD excused themselves for that day and we arranged for another day. It means that I ended up visiting School-C for the 3rd time and I was beginning to think that I was chasing shadows, but in the end everything happened as planned.
3.11 Coding of schools and participants